Matching Ohms For Head Phones???

[LAB3]

I was looking at Beyerdynamic DT 770 headphones and noticed they

can be had in 3 different Ohm models. 32, 80 and 250 ohm models. I had no idea, duh. So I looked at my Revox A-77 MKIV Dolby reel recorder and it has it's head phone output was 200/600 ohms No-Electrostatic?? I plug into it more than any of the others.

My Yamaha amp is 100 ohm output for the head phones.. So I called the Beyerdynamic Factory Tech Support Deptartment
and explain all this to him. He said the Pro 80 Ohms would work fine on
all my equipment??? One of the members here posted the higher the ohm harder it is to drive it. I had been "Borrowing" wife's Bose Acoustic N/C and it sounded the same in either phone jack. I hated the short cord and a battery to deal with. So I started the "Can" search. ahhhhhhhhhhh


Well ...........I purchased a Audio Technica ATH-A700 as I wanted a closed design and it was less expensive and it is a 64 Ohm. Will my Revox hurt it???

 

[BmWr75]

Nope. The Revox will not hurt your new cans.

 

[LAB3]

Nope. The Revox will not hurt your new cans.

Thanks, the more I read the more I realize just how little I "Really"

know about some of my equipment. I had no idea there were different

ohm head phones.

 

[33&athird]

I had no idea there were different

ohm head phones.

Uh-huh, headphones actually have a hell of a range, from 8ohm up to a couple thousand. Most you'll run across are 32 to 600ohms, though you can find some outside that range.

Your yamaha has 100 ohm output, this is the amount of impedance(ohms) the headphone amplifier "wants" to see to operate in the most linear range of it's output. Not to worry, though...amps will accept a range of devices. General rule of thumb is to go with the closest value. In this case, lower will technically stress, and draw more current than what the amplifer really wants to. A higher value phone will draw less current, and have overall lower volume. Again, not to worry. The best thing about headphone amps is they output very little voltage/wattage, so they tolerate a wide range extremely well, since most devices handle headphone output extremely well. Even at 64ohms, 32ohm, etc. your yamaha won't hurt them at all, and they won't hurt it (unless you crank it up way past painful volume and burn them out)

Pretty slick set of headphones, I hope you enjoy them:thmbsp:

 

[LAB3]

Uh-huh, headphones actually have a hell of a range, from 8ohm up to a couple thousand. Most you'll run across are 32 to 600ohms, though you can find some outside that range.

Your yamaha has 100 ohm output, this is the amount of impedance(ohms) the headphone amplifier "wants" to see to operate in the most linear range of it's output. Not to worry, though...amps will accept a range of devices. General rule of thumb is to go with the closest value. In this case, lower will technically stress, and draw more current than what the amplifer really wants to. A higher value phone will draw less current, and have overall lower volume. Again, not to worry. The best thing about headphone amps is they output very little voltage/wattage, so they tolerate a wide range extremely well, since most devices handle headphone output extremely well. Even at 64ohms, 32ohm, etc. your yamaha won't hurt them at all, and they won't hurt it (unless you crank it up way past painful volume and burn them out)

Pretty slick set of headphones, I hope you enjoy them:thmbsp:

Thank You for the information. I was more worried about the old Revox output rated at 200/600 ohms. I need to Google Non - Electrostatic head phones. Just curious to see what was going on 30 years ago.

Glad I found this site. Thanks to all that have Helped. I will be glad when the new "cans" arrive.... so will the wife.

Louis

 

[BmWr75]

In general......higher resistance (ohm) headphones are harder to power (i.e., require a better, high power amp). There are exceptions though. For example AKG 701/702 are rated at 62 ohms, but are said to be hard to drive. This means an iPod will not be very loud or sound very good with higher resistance cans.

 

[elcoholic]

Where you have to be careful is with tube only output stage headphone amps. They won't put out much current. So if you give them too low of an imediance they can't deliver the current and won't drive the HPs very well. For low impedence phones you're better off with a hybrid or ss amp. There's an interesting discussion over at head-fi.org on the all-tube Schiit Valhalla amp and what it can or can't drive.

 

[LAB3]

I purchased a Rolls 4 channel Headphone amplifier it was not expensive and has 4 input jacks and seperate volume controls and out put is 51 ohms each. After the advice I got.( not to worry about new cans being damaged in a 200/600 ohm machine) I was more interested in the 4 inputs as my son likes to record with me at night
so I can plug the Rolls in the Revox and we can both listen to the recordings. Some were my late Dad's he made many years ago. Waiting on new ATH-A700 cans

Great Site I have learned a lot in a few days

Louis

 

[LAB3]

Help

My new ATH-A700 headphones arrived today. Just plugged them into my old Revox reel to reel............ahhhhhhhhh very weak volume??????? Tried them in my Yamaha A/V Yamaha Receiver not much better and cranked the volume up Very loud. I was crushed........... went back to the Den and plugged into CD player...........HELLO... REALLY clear Great Volume. I then plugged them into my old Kenwoood A/V Receiver the Yamaha RX-V2400 7.1 replaced..........wow even better volume had to turn the volume Down and played with the EQ.

The new cans are 64 ohms.........why the poor sound on my 5 year old Yamaha jack? Wife's Bose cans were loud.
100 ohm output???????????

I then plugged the wife's Bose Acoustic Noise cancelling cans,battery fully charged, in Revox..great volume but the same muddy bass......the reason I got the new cans. 30 year old Revox is a 200/600 ohm phone jack. Stumped???

Waiting on the Rolls headphone amp, hope it cures the volume problem on the Revox.
I have the new cans playing on the Kenwood with medium volume breaking them in.

I have a new Onkyo AV Receiver TX-SR805 to replace the Yamaha..... True HD audio and video options the yamaha did not have for Bluray movies on 7.2 speaker system. You can bet tomorrow the Yamaha is unplugged and hope the Onkyo will have better phone jack volume.

EDIT UPDATE


I had the Yamaha on while wife was watching a movie yesterday.......duh...................... plugged new cans into Yamaha (CD mode) this morning WOW so clear and great "real" bass, volume is Great. Works better in Revox after 15 hours of being played all night but near as loud as wife's Bose. But much cleaner and clearer sound.
Great deal for less than $115.00 delivered. Happy

 

[33&athird]

EDIT UPDATE

I had the Yamaha on while wife was watching a movie yesterday.......duh...................... plugged new cans into Yamaha (CD mode) this morning WOW so clear and great "real" bass, volume is Great. Works better in Revox after 15 hours of being played all night but near as loud as wife's Bose. But much cleaner and clearer sound.
Great deal for less than $115.00 delivered. Happy

, we've all been there (I think it's a rite of passage to think your stereo is broken because of a tape monitor switch). Glad you found the problem...I was reading through it thinking "well, this can't be right. it shouldn't be doing that:scratch2:".

The Revox thing is a little weird, perhaps it being older the head amp section isn't as willing to output the extra current needed from the lower resistance?, hard telling. I highly supect when you install a headphone amp (like it sounds you will) then everything will be super, since then you just have to be matching one output resistance (from the head. amp), and it should easily drive them:yes:.

Good luck with the new headphone amp:thmbsp:

 

[Squonk07]

, we've all been there (I think it's a rite of passage to think your stereo is broken because of a tape monitor switch).

Ditto. Except that I was dumb enough to forget to turn the volume back down when I found the problem and got an ear full of blasting gangsta rap (the only FM station that came in without an antenna) as a result. It was like looking down the nozzle of a stopped hosepipe and getting a face full of water when the kink straightened out.

 

[LAB3]

, we've all been there (I think it's a rite of passage to think your stereo is broken because of a tape monitor switch). Glad you found the problem...I was reading through it thinking "well, this can't be right. it shouldn't be doing that:scratch2:".

The Revox thing is a little weird, perhaps it being older the head amp section isn't as willing to output the extra current needed from the lower resistance?, hard telling. I highly supect when you install a headphone amp (like it sounds you will) then everything will be super, since then you just have to be matching one output resistance (from the head. amp), and it should easily drive them:yes:.

Good luck with the new headphone amp:thmbsp:

I just plugged the ATH-A700 into the Revox and I am playing a recording....volume is just fine now............wow what a difference after "Breaking In" the new cans. I thought that was BS about needing to play new headphones for a day or so before they got "Right" What great sound and light weight for less than $115.00 shipped. Still waiting on the amp, the feature for pluging in 4 cans is what I will need now. will see if the Rolls helps any on the amp side, don't think I will need that now.

Thanks to all that have advised me on this topic. Great Site.

Louis

 

[LAB3]

My Rolls head phone amp arrived. Plugged it in and after some testing I have found that past about 40% volume on the amp I here "trash" . So I backed the volume down a little on the amp and turned up the the volume from Revox from 5 to 8 (0 to 10 settings) and the sound is clean and clear and MUCH louder. I really just need the Rolls for the 4 output jacks so my son and I can each have our head phones on late at night while we make and listen ot old reels of tapes from my late parents from 40 years ago.

Last week when I first opened the Audio-Techinca ATH-A700 "cans" the volume on the Revox reel to reel was very poor. But after several days of use .Hello. the ATH-A700 woke up..sound just loud enough on 30 year old recorder that a amp is not not needed.....still not a bad deal on the Rolls for $40.00. and 4 outputs. I would like to hear one of the expensive tube type head phone amps.I have read some posts about how clear they are.